Klondike Derbies are a Scout event that reward scale and planning.  These outdoor skills competitions require boys to work together at the basic unit of the sled (3-8 youth) and each sled contributes an adult to run an event or station for the day.  The program is self-scaling so if 30 sleds register you have 30 stations as long as the planners have enough activities planned and with appropriate equipment.  This year, a troop asked me to run a station as most of their adults were busy and I dusted off the atlatls for the first time in three years.  I arrived early, set up a range, and met the leader that would take over for me around lunch when I had to leave.  I enjoyed getting back into running actual Scout program as each sled would have one or two boys old enough to remember me from my halcyon days as Grandmaster of Program for Playwicki District and the forest rang with someone shouting “TERRY!” every ten minutes or so.

Even though I now weight lift, I no longer have the sheer momentum I used to and my atlatl darts didn’t travel quite as far.  In one or two cases, a kid would out distance me and be hailed as champion by his peers.  I smiled.

On the way out, someone mentioned that another leader had said the guy running the atlatl station was a bad influence on kids because he was wearing shorts on such a cold day and that the guy who used to run the Klondike Derby did that but wasn’t around anymore.  I smiled again.